


the head and the heart

by SearchingforSerendipity



Category: Agatha Christie's Poirot (TV), Poirot - Agatha Christie
Genre: Friendship/Love, M/M, Period Typical Attitudes, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-14
Updated: 2018-03-14
Packaged: 2019-03-31 07:39:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13970394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SearchingforSerendipity/pseuds/SearchingforSerendipity
Summary: Of course Hastings was aware such things happened, and his own particular tastes in the matter. The surprising thing was that he had gone and taken a fancy to Poirot, of all possible people.





	the head and the heart

 

 

“All’s well that ends well,” Hastings said.

He took a sip of the cognac with pleasure. Poirot’s choice in spirits tended towards overly lush and too dry, but he had really marvelous taste in cognac. “Edmund Klein is behind bars, Mrs Klein is avenged, and her daughter is rightfully freed. And Miss Taylor! I almost thought she would float away in joy.”

Poirot put down the tumbler on the low coffee table with a click. He stayed on his feet, holding his glass and staring out of the window. Dusk had fallen. It was raining, but it had been raining for weeks, and the pattering of water of the windows was a reassuring constant.

“Indeed she was. A most perspicacious young woman, Mademoiselle Taylor. It does Poirot good to see such bright little grey cells in the young.”

Hastings stretched his legs and settled more comfortably on the armchair. He held up the short crystal glass to his eyes. Like this the walls of the flat were tinted golden-white, Poirot fractured a dozen times into a blurred sliver of a man.

Hastings took a sip, hoping to steady himself. He endeavored to go on as cheerfully as possible.

“And the true will was found - truly wonderful work there, Poirot! Who would have thought it would be hidden in the gardening shed?”

“Who indeed, but Poirot?” Poirot asked, huddling in his armchair with his chin tucked in and nose in the air. Such a look of satisfaction had no business being endearing.

“Miss Klein has been established as a free, rich young woman in possession of her family estate, and Miss Taylor is to stay with her for the foreseeable future.”

“So it is decided?” Poirot asked, holding his hands towards the low flames in the fireplace. The winter months did not agree with him; always he was wrapped in layers and mittens, warm insolation to keep the cold out.

“She’s moving in tomorrow, I believe.”

“I see,” Poirot said crisply.

“Don’t tell me you disapprove,” Hastings said, trying to sound only casually interested, hoping his countenance did not give him away. _Please don’t say you disapprove_. “You’re the one who fought for Annabeth Klein’s innocence.”

“It is no one’s place to approve or disapprove. Her innocence has nothing to do with the matter,” Poirot said quite stiffly.

“Quite so,” he said, growing incensed despite himself. “It is not a matter of guilt, and surely not a crime! I for one am glad they had found happiness in freedom and each other, and wish them all the best.”

Poirot blinked, the grave detachment he had been adopting fading away. He sought to hide it, but Hastings knew him too well, and though rare, it was genuine surprise if ever he had seen it.

He hid a smile behind his glass, his anxiety and temper softening a little with amusement. It wasn’t always that one so startle Hercule Poirot. “I surprise you, perhaps. It is unorthodox, but if they have such affection for each other, I hardly see the harm in it.”

He had an idea on how he expected Poirot to react - Poirot, who was a singular fellow, not given to the usual prejudices of society, but nonetheless was a faithful Catholic - but his friend nodded with great surety. “You don’t need to champion the good mesdemoiselles’ cause to me. Few deserve peace and joy as much as they.”

Yes, Annabeth Klein and Vivian Taylor had had a ghastly year, what with Miss Klein’s half-brother murdering their mother, only for her to be framed, and then Miss Taylor’s parents demands for her to abandon her friend in her time of need.

Needless to say, Miss Taylor had done no such thing, and kept campaigning for Annabeth’s sake, even going so far as to use the last of her independent economic means to buy Poirot’s services, without ever doubting her friend’s word. Hastings quite liked her for that. Also, it was rare to find anyone so knowledgeable and enthusiastic about golf, much less a young lady.

She had told him, about herself and Annabeth, their long friendship. How they had known each other has children, grown together at school, shared dresses and secrets until considering life without her was a painful prospect.

And then she had told him about how they had fallen in love. Something about Poirot often made him people’s confidante, and he did his best to capitalise on that. But this was unlike any such professional conversation. More than confidence in his silence and trustworthiness, Vivian Taylor had looked at Arthur Hastings, and from the first they had understood each other very well.

He frowned, because he had not expected it to sting that much, but it was not pleasant to be so misunderstood by someone so close. “I can’t blame you. I know I’m a traditional chap, more than the times demand. But really, Poirot. It is as you said - no one’s business to disapprove or not. If they are dear companions to each other, and trust each other enough to enter a - a committed understanding, then, I say, it is a rather splendid thing, is it not?”

It was not a rhetorical question, but it was full of conviction. Poirot softened, a process that was subtle and not altogether unlike thawing. The tilt of his head was a little apologetic. “ _Mais oui, certainement._ The most splendid of things. I should have known _mon ami_ Hastings would be too much of a romantic to frown on _les jeunes amants_.”

He tilted his head. “I was surprised, though I should not have been. You have become wise, mon ami, while I was busy being clever.”

Hastings shifted in his seat and cleared his throat. He felt light-headed with relief, and maybe a little too much cognac.

“I’ve grown old, you mean. It will catch up with you too one day.”

He said it jokingly, but they both knew it was true. The days when it was difficult to believe age would ever seriously touch Poirot were gone, had disappeared after the war. His energy was still astounding, his intellect as sharp as ever, but it was impossible to ignore the slowness of his gait in winter. Age touched them all.

“Hastings, have you given any thought on marriage?”

It was a sudden question, and curious. But he was used to those from Poirot, and all things considered it was not so strange. Hastings gave it the thought that it deserved, and perhaps took a little longer than necessary. No one could blame him for savoring being the focus of Poirot’s singularly potent interest.

“It is a fine institution, by all accounts. Well,” he corrected, thinking of his parents polite unhappiness, and the high number of similar society marriages he had encountered in his life. “Not all accounts. I suppose it depends on the people, and the circumstances. One must always endeavor to conduct one’s self respectably, and with the greatest consideration. Why do you ask?”

Poirot gave one of his expansive shrugs, so unlike any gesture Hastings had grown up seeing. No one else, writer or actor, could speak so eloquently as Poirot with his shrugs.

“I wonder at times that you have not partaken on the institution. Time was when you were eager to find a Mrs Hastings.”

“The right lady never showed up.”

“Not even Miss Duveen?” Poirot asked. Hastings had seen interrogating enough people from all walks of life to know he was undeterrable when hunting for an answer. Something about the combination of cajoling words and compassionate pauses, the open posture and the forthright gaze, loosened tongues more quickly than threats or violence ever could.

This was not Poirot the cajoling detective. It was Poirot the worried friend. There was a world of differences between the two of them, small because at the core of him Poirot always cared, was always genuinely invested in other people’s lives.

Great, because Hastings was not a suspect. His trust in Poirot was not conditional to grief or pressured by circumstances. And despite how he was wont to behave when it came to secretive matters, Poirot did value that trust. He reciprocated it, too, as much as someone as brilliant and self-contained as him could trust anyone else, though Lord alone knew why. Hastings was all too aware of his own many failings and lacks, and no doubt Poirot was too.

“Not even her,” he said. There was true sadness in that confession. Sometimes, on his more wistful moments, he closed his eyes and imagined what wonderful children they might have had, the life they might have lived. Long days, warm nights, fireflies caught in marmalade jars, jokes about the cows and which pair of boots stunk the most, the security of great expanses of land and sky enveloping them. A part of him mourned that life still.

“Cinders was marvelous, mind me, anyone would be a fool to think otherwise. But I’m not the sort of husband that would have suited her best. Our temperaments were too different.”

“Ah, but is it not said that opposites do attract?”

“Attract, of course, but I wonder at the duration of such an attraction. We would have been happy, Cinders and I, for a time at least. But it probably said something inauspicious that I was more interested in the idea of moving to Argentina than marrying.”

“You did move to Argentine,” Poirot said, an uneasy crease between his brows. There were piles and piles of his letters in Hastings’ bedside table. He wrote often but terribly; whatever else he might be, Hercule Poirot was not a talented correspondent. He did regularly send packets of good tea and better spirits, and for that Hastings had forgiven him his pointed, often unasked for advice from the other side of the ocean. 

Hastings nodded. “And I still travel there every year, because of the farm. But it is for the best I did not marry her. She deserved a better husband. I’d have done right by her, but I don’t know if I’d have made her happy. It was best that we parted before she was seriously disappointed.”

“You suppose her disappointment to be a certain outcome, when I know for a fact the young lady was most fond of you,” Poirot protested.

Hastings managed a half-smile, looking away. “Come now, Poirot. We both know that I’m not nowhere close what ladies dream about. And she was much too young regardless,” he added, before Poirot could soften with pity, or worse, deny it. “I’m not that much of a cad.”

At that Poirot laughed outright, as if the idea of Hastings as anything resembling a handsome rake was absolutely hilarious. It would have been far more offensive if he hadn’t had such contagious laughter, always bright and belly-deep at its most surprised. No one made him laugh as often or as much as Hastings, something he was always a little bit proud of, even when it was as his own expense.

Besides, Hastings would have been a miserable man if he hadn’t been able to laugh at himself.

“Alright, alright. So maybe I am not Don Juan come again – ,” he started between chuckles, but then Poirot snorted behind his hand, shaking with it. “ – but I wouldn’t laugh so much if I were you.”

He waggled his forefinger, borrowing the knowing fashion Poirot was so fond of. “I know all about Hercule Poirot’s weak spots. No use in denying it, it is no mystery to me.”

”Is that so?” Poirot asked, skepticism mellowed by indulgence.

Hastings leaned forward, lowering his voice confidentially. “Indeed I do. Don't worry, I shall keep your secret. It would not do for criminals to know all they had to do was place a pair of thwarted lovers in your path to distract your hopeless romantic’s soft heart.”

“Poirot is never distracted,” he said with passable haughtiness. A hint of mirth kept curling the corner of his mouth, before it smoothed into something more solemn. “But it is truth that I do not like grief where there is no need for it. It is hateful and wasteful. The little grey cells, they give order to all things, but it is the heart that shapes them. Think of how much it endures in any person’s lifetime! I am a romantic, if a romantic thinks like this. But not without hope. Non, never hopeless.”

In a musing mood Poirot was half a poet, half philosopher. There was a peculiar bright light in his eyes just then. It was, Hastings thought to himself, quite a formidable sight.

“That,” he said, flushed and suddenly sober, “that I could cheer to.” And they did; their glasses came together with a sweet high sound, and the drink chased away the last of the night’s chill.

 

 

 

 

Never hopeless, Poirot had said. Later that night Hastings lay in bed and wondered at that. He had no hopes himself, and it didn’t harm him all that much anymore. He had never been one for lofty ambitions, which was just as well, with the road his life had taken. But it was impossible to ignore it, on certain nights while Poirot snored two doors away and sleeplessness set in for the achingly long hours, he reread Poirot’s letters in the dark. _Mon cher ami_ , started every one of his missives, his sloped handwritten giving life to his voice with the greatest clearly in Hastings’ mind. It brought him a quiet delight to remember the words, the farewells and the homecomings.

Of course Hastings was aware such things happened, and his own particular tastes in the matter. There was nothing to be done about the matter. Hastings had grown up and grown old, fought in a war and survived its aftermath. Somewhere along the years he had made his peace with it, as much as he could.

The surprising thing was that he had gone and taken a fancy to Poirot, of all possible people. Although fancy might be the wrong world. He fancied pretty girls with auburn curls and sharp tongues. He'd had an ardent and embarrassing fancy on the rowing team captain in Cambridge, jolly Jack Fink with those dark eyes and strong arms. And there had been Edwin Robertson in the army, who had sat beside him sharing rations and terrible jokes by the radio on the torturous quiet lulls between fighting in the trenches. Hastings still left flowers by Edwin’s grave whenever he was close to Liverpool.

There was nothing wrong with fancies, they gave a new delightful favor to life for a brief time, and faded in due course, leaving faint pangs of regret and happiness behind. His loves had never been the stuff of grand stories, never so honest and deep as any of the ones he’d read on the novels borrowed from his sisters’. No great romantic hero was Arthur Hastings. He had always suspected that truth, and the older he was the clearer it became. In part, too, because his understanding of what a hero was changed. He preferred not to think of it, and still he was liable to be called an idealist, but no one could go through without a couple of disappointments, including in one’s self.  

What he felt for Poirot was separate from those fancies, and he had long decided that he would allow it to be limited a disappointment. That would be a lie and a disrespect, and as it did not seem likely to pass anytime soon it was not something he would allow to grow in his heart in the shape of a bitter mould. Goodness knew he has been waiting long enough for it to go away. 

Nor did it seem likely that it would weaken and flag when faced with strain and the most disagreeable parts of his character. He was well aware of Poirot's many shortcomings, the height of his arrogance, the vastness of his vanity. That was what came when you lived closely in shared quarters with someone for more than a decade, with many interruptions for long trips and separate responsibilities. He had faced the worst of Hercule Poirot, seen and shared the best of times, and found himself rather stupidly devoted to the whole of him.

The realization had been sudden and unwelcome – he had tripped on it one morning as banal as any other, blinking sleep out of his eyes to the sight of Poirot cutting his toast into identical pieces. And perhaps he had acted rashly in booking a sudden trip to South America when it became impossible to ignore, but that had been years ago. He could not regret that trip, for it had given him the distance and clarity of thought to face himself, to regain his footing.

Between long walks through vast grass fields and paging through ledgers he had thought matters through. Poirot might have known or might not; it mattered curiously little. If he did, then he did not seem to believe it a great problem. Hastings had his longings, but all men had a secret yearning in their hearts. He endeavored to make sure that it did not diminish the quality of his life, the depth and ease of their friendship. 

There was a certain nobility found in the humility of loving another without the need for a response, without making a fuss. He had returned to London once more, and if his heart leaped in joy to see Poirot waiting at the station, then he was determined that there was nothing intrinsically wrong about it.

It was Poirot; to be glad to see him was the easiest and most natural of things. To return to his rooms in Whitehaven Mansion was sweet and strange, made sweeter for its strangeness. To know that this was a place where true affection lived changed everything without changing anything at all. He did not travel less or more, did not flee or cling or change his behavior. Their friendship was true and tried. They were associates, roommates, confidantes, partners in and against crime. Whatever else he might wish for, he was content with his lot.

 

 

 

 

  
The idea had been Poirot’s. It was rare for Poirot to insist on getting out of the house in winter without the motivation of a case. House fever usually made him irritable and impatient, his temper fierce.

The last few days had been the exception. A peculiar state had come over him. It had him sitting by the window, staring out at the rainfall for hours on end. Hastings fretted quietly at first, but it became clear that the matter at hand was not a maudlin mood, or even an attack of homesickness, as Poirot sometimes fell into when his absence from Brussels and all it had held for him became too heavy. He wasn’t agitated, or particularly melancholic. Simply deep in thought, turned inwards in the trail of some important consideration. He would not rest until the answers were found and a resolution drawn upon.

Miss Lemon gave Hastings a questioning look while paging through the morning’s mail. He could do nothing but shrug her way; they both knew that when Poirot fell into one of these moods there was nothing to be done until he found some satisfying solution. A matter of time, but until then there would be much distracted muttering in French and building of houses of cards.

Eventually, his presence being either ignored or subjected to the long, still looks, he had gone out after breakfast to take care of pressing business matters, leaving Poirot dictating letters to Miss Lemon as she tapped the typewriter keys as effectively as ever, even if her usual impressive speed was impossible with her fingers cramped and visibly reddened from the cold.

It had not yet stopped pouring violently. The central heating that made it a warm haven in the overcast city meant the flat was insulated enough to shame a heavy duty warship, the cold wind battling and trying to whistle through the windows of the flat during the worst gusts of rain.

As Hastings reminded himself, hesitating on the threshold before gathering his courage and umbrella, he was sorry to head out of the comfort of the flat, but there were questions he had be involved in about his investments in the country and abroad. Despite what his few published books made it seem, and as the many less sensational unpublished manuscripts in his desktop would reveal, he did not in fact spend much of his time chasing after Poirot. There was more to life than aiding investigations. Hastings did not need to toil his days away as other’s might, being one of the dying breed of gentlemen of leisure, but there were a number of business matters to be attended every week, and it was on meeting and offices that he spent many of his mornings, visiting the companies where he owned shares.

Today he was reviewing overviews of recent developments on an iron railway production in Denmark, a surprisingly riveting reading for him that had always been fond of trains. Poirot too had spoken about taking a trip in the future, possibly farther East, or in America. Not a holiday in the strict sense of the word, because knowing Poirot a dead body was going to show up in the driver’s cabin, or a stowaway with nefarious intentions would make themselves known, but Hastings was greatly looking forward to that journey, crime and all.

Restlessness kept him away from his club. This was not unusual. Aimless wandering was, as far he was concerned, one of life’s best gifts, all the more so when the rain stopped. He stopped at shop windows and bought enough chestnuts to keep him full, walked the streets until his feet were comfortably tired and more than a little damp from misstepping on rainwater puddles, and his head felt as light as he liked it to be.

That ought to have been the end of the day, as it often was, but the moment he crossed the threshold of the flat he was being shepherded toward his bedroom to change for dinner, take off his muddy shoes, and to ‘dress properly, for goodness’ sake, don’t wear that horrible green jacket’. Poirot was in high spirits, higher than they had been for weeks, and the surprise and relief of it made Hastings comply, even as he fiddled with his lapels and twisted Hastings’ tie into perfect symmetry.

“You still haven’t told me where we are going,” Hastings complained, waiting by the Whitehaven Mansion foyer door while Poirot wrapped his mufflers even more securely around himself.

“It is not necessary for you to know as of yet,” Poirot said serenely.

“Has anyone told you your high-handedness is most disagreeable?”

Poirot crinkled his eyes up at him in a smile. He was almost entirely swaddled in furs and thick wool, mustache and all, so that only his this tip of his nose and pince-nez braved the cold. “You have, Hastings, many times. Not always so politely. Come! Don’t frown so. It doesn’t suit you, and with this cold your face might freeze like that.”

Hastings sighed. It was a bother to be properly annoyed when Poirot was so determined on being irreverent.

He held out his arm with the thoughtlessness of experience. Poirot’s leg injury, acquired during Brussels’ invasion, pained him more in the cold weather. He never asked for assistance, proud creature that he was, but Hastings had noticed how much more he relief on his cane the first winter they had roomed together, and had started offering his arm when it seemed needed. Inconspicuously, of course, and awkwardly at first. Poirot rarely remarked on it, but he always took the offer, always expressed his thankfulness with that quiet regard of his or some small gesture.

Hastings took no pleasure in his friend’s discomfort, of course; but he had, perhaps, come to look forward to winter a little more than before, if only for the pleasure of that companionable gesture.

Poirot patted his gloved hand, entwining their arms as Hastings opened the door and they braved the cold. “Have some patience, mon ami. It shall be rewarded in time.”

It was, too. Poirot kept quiet the whole taxi ride to their destination after whispering the address on the driver’s ear, making a show of refusing to answer any queries or guesses. His reaction to Hastings’ attempts at deduction revealed nothing, not even when Hastings gave up on the plausible and dedicated himself to the absurd.

“You have tickets to a private play featured by Sarah Bernhart.”

Poirot shook his head, dimpling despite himself. “Madame Bernhart has been dead for years.”

“Who’s to say she didn’t fake her death? The number of notorious you’ve uncovered from a false grave is staggering. Nothing you do can surprise me.”

“I’ve never met anyone as gullible as you,” Poirot said. The car was small and Poirot was stout, made more so by the layers he was wearing. Their knees were pressed closely together. Hastings could smell his cologne, a smell so familiar it was imprinted in the walls of their flat and the grooves of the armchairs. “It is a wonder you haven’t been lead astray more often.”

Hastings defended himself, blithely ignoring the many times he _had_ been cheated or lead astray in some manner through the years. As Poirot had done the part of rescuer more than once before, it was unlikely he would forget them, but there was point in bringing them up. “You might think as you please, but as time passes the more I find cynicism to be bleak. And anyway, I like being surprised. It makes life more interesting.”

“I shall strive not to lead you astray then,” Poirot declared, as the car stopped in front of their destination. “Or bore you, which I expect you would consider to be the worse fate.”

As it was, going to the theatre with Poirot was never anything resembling boring. There was always a number of people interested in speaking with him, both among the audience and the actors. More than once on similar outings the representation had been revealed as owning a criminal component of some sort. Poirot was a firm believer that Hamlet had been on to something when he staged his denouement. Between greetings and introductions, they had made their way between throngs of the well-bred and the well-dressed towards their seats just before the lights dimmed and the curtains opened.

They had stayed like that, heads tilted together whispering and paging through the librettos, even during intermission, until the last strains of Mozart faded and they walked out towards their favorite restaurant, the one with the chocolate ganache recipe Poirot approved off and the roast beef Hastings loved.

“You see, Hastings? It is much the better that you are no Don Juan - or Don Giovanni, as the case may be. His life was one of deceit and irresponsible pleasure, with a finale most fitting.”

“I think Mozart might have been more interested in the music than the morals.”

Poirot waved his forkful of cake in a sweeping gesture. It was an annoyingly elegant gesture.“Now, Wagner was a detestable man, and Verdi was a misanthrope, but Mozart! He was a man of principles.”

“Did you deduce that from the music or the biographies?”

Poirot gave him an arch look while cleaning his mouth with a napkin, with care not to injure his mustache. “Both, if you must know. One illuminates the other, but certain qualities of the whole of the work are transparent. The personality, you see, shines through in actions. It is always so.”

Hastings smiled. He certainly had no interest in Mozart’s biographies. His favorites were more along the lines of Verne. No thrilling mysteries or melodramatic romances for Poirot, who was fond of pointing out he found enough of both in his professional life. What he really liked were the classics – the fellow did so love his Dickens and Hugo – and barring that biographies, the longer the better.

It beggared belief, but by all means he truly enjoyed them. He found them more intriguing than fiction, as well as useful studies into human nature, so that Hastings had made it a point in his travels to stop by distinguishes book stores and second-hand fairs alike, in search of biographies on the most bizarre characters.

The prize so far went to an Italian tome Hastings had found in Florence, a whooping six hundred pages on Caravaggio’s life and times. Poirot knew not a lick of Italian besides the basics, but Hastings did, courtesy of Eton, and on his interest in languages, being that they were the only subjects in which he showed anything resembling promise as a boy. Naturally Poirot had made him his translator, and many an evening had been spent in that fashion, Hastings reading and availing himself to his old dictionary, with Poirot listening, and commenting almost as often.

This much he knew: those evenings, and evenings like this one, were the happiest he would ever be.

“ _Mon ami_ ,” Poirot said, and Hastings blinked. “Where have you gone to gather the linen?”

“Woolgathering.” As Poirot well knew. But his goal had been achieved. Hastings was smiling again; Poirot smiled back, his regard warm in the flickering chandelier light. “And nowhere. There’s nowhere I’d rather be.”

 

 

 

  
The setting, he had to admit, was quite fine. The moon was fat and high, the sky as clear as could be reasonably expected in London. Arm in arm, wrapped tightly in furls and wools, full of good food and good wine: Hastings barely felt the cold. They had set off towards the closest park for a peaceful stroll, and it was under the light of a wrought iron lamp-post that Poirot made his denouement .

“I beg your pardon?” Hastings said.

“You are pardoned,” Poirot conceded with a nod. It would have come across as magnanimous if his back were not painfully straight, hands folded in the fur-lined sleeves of his long coat.

Hastings furrowed his eyebrows and started carefully. “You’ll have to repeat yourself. I didn’t understand. I fear my hearing has failed me.” Or his wits. Either seemed a more likely option than to think he had heard correctly.

“I am asking whether you would be interested in a courtship.”

Hastings came to a halt at once. Poirot stopped beside him. The trees pressed close together around them, hiding them from view from the rest of the park; a small place, with a moss-covered fountain in the middle, no one else to be seen, no noises but their voices and the murmuring of leaves. Poirot had probably chosen to take this path for that purpose.

“Really - Be serious, Poirot.”

“I assure you, _mon ami_ , I am in the greatest earnest.”

Hastings had acted like a fool for a lot of reasons. He was used to it. But this was a novelty he had not expected in the least. He opened his mouth and closed it a couple of times. “A court— me? You want to court me?”

“Why, of course you. Do you think I’m talking to somebody else?” Poirot said. The impatient tone he adopted came from nerves he could not mask. He was, Hastings noticed, nervous. That was what first solidified the reality of the situation in his mind. Poirot, formidable Poirot, almost afraid. His own heart skipped several beats. “I wish to press my suit.”

“Your suit,” Hastings echoed faintly.

“Should it be welcome.“

There has been no indications. Hastings was no real detective, that was true, but surely he would have noticed if Poirot had taken to paying him - and he could not yet believe he was even thinking this - special attentions? Poirot had kept the plans for the night a secret, but that was not that rare. Hastings liked surprises, and Poirot liked being surprising. Liked to surprise him in particular, he supposed, was always clearly pleased at being the cause of his delight, through the unexpected or the comfortably familiar. There was nothing out of the ordinary in that.

It struck him that that in itself was rather telling. The thought was too vast for him to accept readily. He grasped at the last vestiges of what he thought to be true. “But you never did seem very interested in such matters. I rather thought you to be a confirmed bachelor in truth.”

“I am as much of a confirmed bachelor as you are, Hastings,” Poirot said delicately. Then, even more gently: “My interest lies with you.”

“Oh Lord,” Hastings said, and hurried towards one of the park benches before his legs gave out.

It wasn’t as if he expected anything would ever come out of it. He was too mundane and haphazard for Poirot, and far too dim. A good friend, but surely not anyone he would enjoy greater affection or intimacy with. Thoughts on what Poirot’s preferences were had always ended up conjuring the blurry idea of some brilliant, extremely well dressed lady detective, or a conniving criminal fellow with a strict code of honor and vast knowledge of high cuisine.

Rarely, if ever, did anyone catch his eye in the romantic fashion, as far as Hastings could perceive, for all that there were a considerable number of people in the course of their investigations who had been charmed by the Belgian detective. Poirot appreciated beauty, but not as Hastings did. Even he had to admit to being shallow at times, and losing all the little sense he had when a pretty woman was in question. That same applied to pretty men, in truth, though Hastings flattered himself that he had managed to hide those attractions passably well. If Poirot noticed he never mentioned it, thankfully.

Well, he was mentioning it _now_.

Poirot sat beside him, on the cleanest spot on the bench. He considered Hastings’ wide eyes and quickened breaths with some dismay. “I understand it is a shock. If you do not return my regard, or wish to do nothing with it, then we will speak no more of it, and all shell return as it was. But it cannot be that much of a surprise to you.”

Hastings pressed a trembling hand to his mouth. Regardless it did little to smother his helpless laugh as he made a vague gesture at the man in front of him. “You’re _you_! Poirot! -“ And who was Poirot, in Hastings’ eyes, if not the most admirable of men, the kindest and the brightest? The dearest? “Of course I am surprised!”

Poirot clicked his tongue. His own voice was not entirely steady when he said, “Do not speak nonsense, Hastings. A man of your beautiful nature has no place being so surprised at a declaration of affection. I tease you often, but you must know how very dear you are to me. Above all others. It has been so for many years.”

Hasting let out a long breath, as much a gasp as a sigh. The whole of him trembled. The cold air burned in his lungs. The armrest of the bench was humid under his hand. This, he was coming to realise, was not a strange dream brought about by too much dessert and too strong a vintage.

And even if it were a dream, he could not have allowed for Poirot to keep watching him like this, face achingly open to him who knew him so well.

He swallowed. Words came easier to him on paper than aloud, and even then they were hardly a work of art. But Poirot knew that, knew all of his failings. And still he said and spoke these things. Hastings would have thought he would be terrified out of his wits, and he was. But it was a relief as well. He had kept his quiet for so long; now that he time had come, he found that he could not stay silent anymore if the world depended on it.

Gathering every reserve of spindly, meager nerve he had, he laid a hand on Poirot’s arm. His friend was solid beneath his touch, solid and real and altogether so dear to him his chest burned with it.

“Poirot. My very dear old friend. Surely you know the extent of my regard. Surely you know that my –“ He shook his head, still skirting the edge of disbelief and all the lay beyond. Christ, what a thing to say aloud! And to mean it too, body and soul, to put it all to words finally, _finally_ , “– that in every way my affections are true to you. Are yours.”

Poirot’s eyes brightened with a new and brilliant light. A gloved hand came to rest over his, to squeeze tightly. “Oh, _mon cher_. I’m so very glad. I had hoped it might be so. With some reason, I believed. But I could not be certain of your answer. You have surprised me before.”

“I have?” Hastings asked, bemused. He was fairly sure Poirot knew him better than he knew himself.

“The Klein case.”

“Ah.” That made quite a lot of sense. To think that hey had both spoken around their own intentions, careful not to reveal the same truth! “That was a relief for me as well.”

“Indeed. But, Hastings, you have not yet answered my question.”

Hastings strengthened his resolve. This was a serious moment, which he intended to do properly, for all that a smile kept stealing into his face. Nonetheless he could feel his ears flushing as he held Poirot’s hand and bowed his head over it. “Hercule Poirot, great detective. I will gladly accept your suit, if you’ll accept mine.”

Poirot laughed soundlessly, shaking with it. His smile was impossibly affectionate and very familiar. It was possible that Hastings was more than a little daft for not having noticed that before. Then again, neither had Poirot, so perhaps it was a matter of the heart as much as of the head. “Arthur Hastings, brave captain. I most gladly do.”  
  
Hastings broke into a smile of his own, breathless with joy, and pressed their clasped hands together. “Then it would seem we do understand each other after all.”

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> come say hi to me on [tumblr](http://searchingforserendipity25.tumblr.com).


End file.
